Wisconsin Badgers

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Wisconsin Badgers 2011 Profile

If winning and BCS games are supposed to help recruiting, why is Wisconsin stuck in the high 30s in national recruiting rank. I know after 2010, that Badgers fans feel the rankings are BS, but the Badgers in the 3 previous years had win totals within 1 game of their predicted value just comparing recruiting ranks.

In sticking with that trend, the Badgers are modeled for 7 wins, and we are moving the expected win total to 8 on a +.5 games coaching effect by the staff.

2010, in my opinion of reading the model was one of those ‘once every few years’ that a good staff with mid-level recruiting puts together. 2011 is back down to the reality of coaching and recruiting levels.

Wisconsin Schedule and SOS/EOS Breakdown

The total SOS for the Badgers in 2011 is ranked #10 in the Big Ten. However, excluding the 2010 season, the model missed on just 5 of 36 Wisconsin games from ’07 – ’09. With that in mind, I expect the team to revert to it’s overall trend which is +/- 1 game each season vs the model.

OOC games are a quick 4-0 for the Badgers. All are at home and they have no home upsets in the last 4 years within the CFBMatrix model. Any OCC loss is an upset.

The conference schedule is very different as the Badgers have the #4 ranked SOS in the Big Ten. They are slightly better at home than on the road. Purdue and Indiana will be beat. However, Nebraska and Penn State pose a different problem. In the last 4 years, Penn State has lost only 4 games on the road in which they out recruited the host the previous 4 years and Nebraska hasn’t lost any in such a manner. Both fit as both out recruited Wisconsin in the last 4 years.

The road may be very unkind to the Badgers in 2011. Outside the 2010 season, Wisconsin has ZERO upset wins the previous 4 years. If the pattern holds, they will lose to MSU, OSU and Illinois.